


Bodyguard Under the Mistletoe

by celli



Category: American Idol (AU)
Genre: Chromatic Character, Community: undermistletoe, First Time, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-12-16
Updated: 2009-12-16
Packaged: 2017-10-15 23:54:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,361
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/166205
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/celli/pseuds/celli
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I'm not here for Christmas, okay? I'm not doing Christmas. I'm not interested in Christmas, and I promise you Christmas isn't interested in me."</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bodyguard Under the Mistletoe

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the Harlequin challenge (prompt: Bodyguard Under the Mistletoe) for [](http://www.livejournal.com/users/undermistletoe/profile)[**undermistletoe**](http://www.livejournal.com/users/undermistletoe/). Thanks to Caro for the speedytastic beta.

Coming out of the closet wasn’t nearly as horrible as David had been afraid it would be.

His mom and dad and brothers and sisters--after a few days of sideways looks and conversations that stopped when he walked into a room--embraced him with full enthusiasm. Really full enthusiasm--he kept having to get them to stop arguing with people on the Internet about him, or printing out personal ads to leave on his bed.

(Well, yes, obviously the point of being gay was to do...stuff...with other boys, but not with “DWM, 37, seeks SHM 18-21 for illusion of innocence.”

That one got wadded up in a ball and used to kindle that night’s marshmallow-roasting fire.)

So that part was embarrassing but live-with-able.

And, oh, his career wasn’t over! Nobody was more surprised than he was. Okay, some places were holding parties to set his Christmas CD on fire, but his straight...uhm...mainstream albums were doing a lot better than he or the label had expected. He’d even spent an awesome summer in the studio recording his new album (and arguing with producers about whether or not his love songs should be to girls or “unspecified”).

He was grateful for his family, and he was grateful he got to keep doing the thing he loved best. He could put up with a lot of concert protesters and scary letters for that--and since he’d moved into his own place in LA when he turned 21, people had even mostly stopped vandalizing his family’s house.

And there was one more reason David got through every day more or less happy with who he was.

“Archie?”

David looked up at the tap on his motorhome door.

“Yeah,” he said, hoping the goofy smile on his face looked like he was excited about singing, not...anything else.

David Cook stood there, all seventeen feet of him (with boots), and grinned. If you just looked at him, all rock goth in worn jeans, purple-streaked hair, and guyliner, you wouldn’t think he was David’s bodyguard. Just a roadie, maybe, or something.

David blushed at the “or something,” but he always blushed around Cook, so it didn’t stand out.

“You ready to go kick ass, chew bubblegum, and sell albums?”

“I’m out of gum,” David said. And then resignedly, “What did I say this time?”

Cook waved a hand as he tried to control his laughter. “We’ll fill in the gaps in your pop culture knowledge later.”

“I don’t think we have that kind of time,” David muttered.

***

The hard part was the walk from the motorhome to the stage door. There were still screaming girls--and now some guys--but unless David could see their faces, he tended to flinch away from everyone indiscriminately.

Cook guided him along the wall, far enough away that most of the thrown stuff landed out of David’s line of vision. The venue security would go through all of it and review anything important with Cook later. There was a trend lately to throw Bibles and Books of Mormon, which David tried not to think too hard about. It probably had something to do with Christmas coming up, even though he didn't sing any religious songs at all, to try and keep the peace. But he'd heard about some people—not even Mormons, mostly, shock radio people and super conservatives—who kept talking about him and talking about him, like he was the personal living sign of something. He could tell when they'd been at it, because it was worse than usual, like tonight.

They cleared the door, and both he and Cook stopped to grab a breath before heading on.

“You okay?” Cook asked, one hand still resting protectively between David’s shoulder blades.

David knew that if he looked or sounded shaky, Cook would stay right there, keeping himself between David and the rest of the world as long as he needed it. He cleared his throat hard.

“Yeah. Thank you, yeah.” He shook out his hands and jittered in place a little, trying to shake everything but the music out of his head. “Let’s go.”

***

Cook was waiting for him in the weensy trailer breakfast nook the next morning, doodling curlicues around the Arts and Leisure section. “’The reception of _Works for Me_ , both critical and commercial,’” he read in a snooty British accent, “’is another sign that Archuleta’s career is more Adam Lambert and less Clay Aiken.’”

“I heard,” David said grimly. “Adam left me a voice mail at two this morning reading the entire thing to me, and when the phone cut him off he called back to laugh maniacally until it cut him off again.”

“Aren’t you glad you didn’t have him in your year?”

“I had your brother through Hollywood Week, and Johns all the way through til he beat me. I suffered for my sins just about enough, thank you.”

Cook snorted. “As someone who’s had the sensurround experience with Andrew on no sleep and all caffeine, I have to agree with you.”

David poked at the banana laid at his plate. “Do you wish you'd gone on the road with Andrew? You could be _his_ bodyguard, or even in his band.”

For a second, there was an expression on Cook’s face that made David inch back in his chair. Then he was back to pleasant, neutral, normal Cook. “Andrew's got his own thing. I like it here,” he said. “Eat your cereal.”

David munched dutifully as Cook reviewed their schedule for the day—phoners later in the morning, writing with a Nashville friend of David's producer in the afternoon—"Oh, and I need to go to the grocery store." David jabbed his spoon at the list, dripping milk along the table.

"I can do it while you're in the studio," Cook said.

"Oh, you're not—you're not staying at the studio?" David plopped his spoon back in his bowl.

"Well, I just thought—"

"Yeah, I never, I mean, it must be really boring to just watch—"

Cook looked up at David. David looked down at his cereal.

***

"That went great, didn't it?" David bounced out of the SUV, trying to hum three songs at once and mostly sounding like a bumblebee.

Cook's eyes were scanning the parking lot, but he was smiling. "Yes."

"Really?"

"Really. Archie, I'll compliment you more if you get in the store."

David stopped in front of the grocery store door and turned, letting it whir frustratedly behind him. "But seriously, there was some good stuff there, right?"

Cook sighed and looked down from where he had David blocked from the parking lot by his body. David didn't blush, but he might have flushed a little. "You're brilliant and you know it. In, Archuleta."

David beamed at him.

The store had carols and tinsel and all sorts of holiday trimmings, and David's traditional love of the holiday tried to jump out from where he'd stuffed and repressed it for the last couple of years. Cook was fascinated, though.

"You should totally decorate your motorhome. You have two more weeks in it, so you might as well make it look like home before you head that way, right?"

"I'm staying in L.A. for Christmas," David said quietly. "It's okay," he added quickly when Cook looked up, "I'm not going out or anything—you can totally go visit your family or whatever you want."

"But you're not."

David thought of the spray paint on the garage the year before, and the brick through his car window with verses from Leviticus wrapped around it. "It's easier to stay in L.A. for the holidays. I'll go visit my family in a month or so."

"Okay," Cook said slowly, giving him one of his indecipherable looks. "But you can still decorate your space. I mean, check it out, fake mistletoe! You could hang it up in the motorhome and ambush random crew members—"

"Stop it." David ripped the mistletoe out of Cook's hands. "I'm not here for Christmas, okay? I'm not doing Christmas. I'm not interested in Christmas, and I promise you Christmas isn't interested in me."

"Hey." Cook grabbed the package of mistletoe and tugged on it, pulling David back into his personal space. "Archie. _Dave._ It's okay."

"You have no idea how not okay it is," David said. He looked up into Cook's face, knowing his eyes were welling up and his face was red. Cook was going to take one look at him and realize—

Cook's hand came down on David's shoulder, one thumb rubbing gently against his collarbone. "I think you might be wrong about that," he said, and David thought for just a second that maybe—

Someone started squealing behind them, and Cook moved automatically in front of David. From around his arm, David could see they were just some teenage girls, but even he knew that teenage girls came standard with cell phone cameras and Internet connections.

Cook was swearing under his breath, and for once David thought about joining in. He let Cook grab his arm and followed him blindly out the front door.

***

The protests ramped up after the pictures hit TMZ. David figured it was all probably worse because they were holding Christmas decorations. By the last concert before the holiday, security had been ramped up twice, and Cook had tried to resign three times. David didn't even have to fake the lost, hurt look by now, and he had a feeling Cook was almost as frustrated with him as with the whole situation.

He didn't care. It would be better after Christmas, and...it would just be better. He firmly refused to think about anything past December 31.

Cook started shouting as soon as they came out of the motorhome—a couple of small groups had broken through the fences nearest them. He pulled David in hard against him, and the other guards threw their weight against the growing crowd as they pushed through.

David tried not to translate the sounds being screamed at him as words, keeping his head down and his hands tight on Cook's waist and arm. Cook was swearing, low and steady, interspersed with grunts as he shoved people away.

"I'm sorry, Archie," he said as they approached the door. There was a loud crash near them, and bits of what looked like brick scattered across the ground in front of them. "This shouldn't be happening to you. I'm so damn sorry."

"I'm not," David said before he realized it was coming out of his mouth.

Cook stumbled to a halt and bent down to look at David—

—and then there was another loud sound and Cook was down on the ground, his eyes unfocused as his head cracked against the pavement.

"Cook!" David yelled, and flailed for the sleeve of the nearest backup guard. "He's hurt! Cook's hurt!"

The guy grabbed for him, but David was flat on top of Cook, trying to protect him with as much of his own body as possible. There were a couple of hard hits to his back, and he braced himself against them. Then suddenly they were gone, and the guards were reaching for him and Cook and helping them inside almost as one unit.

"Cook." David ignored the rush of people around them and the flood of words, mostly aimed at him, and stayed on top of Cook. "Oh, my God, you have to be okay. Cook. _Cook_."

***

A gentle hand shook David's shoulder, and he came instantly awake, looking up at the nurse. She smiled and pointed at Cook's bed, where he was moving around and muttering a little.

"Cook," David said, then winced and lowered his voice. He slid the chair closer to the bed and laid a hand on Cook's arm. "Hey, wake up."

"Archie?" Cook groped around with his free hand and covered David's with it. "Did you beat me up? I feel like crap. Dead crap warmed over. Then killed again."

"You got hit in the head a little with a rock," David told him.

"A little?"

"It was a fairly small rock, and you have a nice hard head. You'll be okay."

"Okay—Archie. Are you okay?" Cook tried to sit up.

David pushed him straight back down. "I'm fine! I'm fine! Stop that."

"Oh. Good." Cook groaned. "They're giving me really good painkillers, right?"

David nodded, even though Cook was only sort of looking in his direction. "They should kick in soon. And your mom is on the first plane she could get out."

"Awesome." Cook's hand flexed over David's. "You're sure you're okay."

David leaned up over the bed. "I'm fine, see?"

Cook's eyes focused more or less on him. "Okay. 'Swhat's important."

"Are you awake enough to talk for a minute, or should I come back after your next round of drugs?"

"I'll try. Stay."

"Okay." David took a deep breath. He'd had a couple of hours to practice this. "I have two things to tell you. The first things is, you're fired."

"Arch," Cook started.

"No, listen. I'm not watching that ever again. I will hire six giant bodyguards straight out of pro wrestling to follow me everywhere I go, but you are _never_ getting hurt for me. Ever."

"I'm really afraid of the second thing now," Cook said, and David could see the real worry on his face.

David pried Cook's hand free of his and turned it over to place something in it. "The second thing is, Merry Christmas."

Cook raised his hand to see the sprig of fake mistletoe more clearly.

"I stole it off the hallway display," David said.

Cook almost laughed, and his face fell back into familiar lines. David relaxed for the first time in what seemed like a century. "Well, it's very nice mistletoe."

"Thank you," David said. "I hear it's very effective."

Cook looked at him for a long minute, and David's heart stopped until Cook raised it a few inches in the air. "Well, you'd better test it. Defective mistletoe is a serious problem."

Fortunately for the both of them, it wasn't defective in the slightest.


End file.
